The Saving Freak wrote an excellent post about gift cards becoming a risky purchase.

Have you ever thought about what a gift card really is?  A gift card is where someone takes the national currency (US Dollar, British Pound, Euro, etc.) and converts it into a store currency.  This severely limits the use of the currency.

And if the company issuing the gift card declares bankruptcy and shuts its doors?  The currency becomes useless.

Read The Saving Freak's article HERE. 

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I have written before about the fact that I have a thirty-year-old house that has thirty-year-old house problems.  One of the problems is that the downstairs AC is the original AC for the house.

Problem 1 - January 2008

It was making a "banging" sound.

Diagnosis: Low on refrigerant - $75.

Problem 2 - May 2008

It was not cooling at all, and it was making a loud electrical "HUMMMMMMMM" sound.

Diagnosis: Condenser unit fan was not operating - $200+

Problem 3 - June 2008

It stopped cooling again.  It was a day before vacation so I decided to have it looked at when I got back home two weeks later.

Diagnosis:  Electrical wiring insulation had worn through and was shorting out the fan - $105

So we are back to enjoying the nice cool air conditioning in the dead-middle of a South Carolina summer.

I wonder when I will have to replace this unit?  Part of me wants to bury my head in the sand and hope that it runs another thirty years.  The realistic side of me says I should go ahead and start pricing out units.  Initial looks have shown a cost of $5K - $7K.  Just what I want to spend my money on …  an air conditioner.

Why do I bring all of this up?  Because it is so important to look ahead when preparing a financial plan.  Jenn and I could pretend that this issue does not exist and then have a financial "emergency" when this AC really does fail permanently.  In the past (when we were always broke), we would ignore this issue and then be surprised when it failed.  Now, we recognize it as a known, upcoming expense, and we plan for it.

I do hope that it lasts another thirty years, though. 

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I have written before about how I am crazy about gardening.

I just love the fact that I can plant a little seed and then see it sprout, grow, and produce tremendous fruits, vegetables, flowers, and foliage.

It is AWESOME!

Over the past month, the garden has produced the following vegetables:

• Dozens of zucchini
• DOZENS of cucumbers
• Strawberries
• Several yellow squash
• A hundred ears of sweet corn
• DOZENS of yellow pear cherry tomatoes
• Several Better Boy tomatoes
• Dozens of bell peppers
• Dozens of jalapeno peppers
• Onions
• Snow peas

And shortly it will produce about a dozen watermelons and at least four canteloupes!  In the fall, I will get to harvest sweet potatoes, peanuts, pumpkins, and butternut squash.

The herb garden has cilantro, basil, chives, and bee balm.

The flower garden has day lillies, surprise lillies, sunflowers, zinnias, gladiolas, purple coneflowers, cleome, aster, marigolds, shasta daisies, sweet william, snapdragons, celosia, coleus, alyssum, coral bells, liatris, and chinese lanterns.

I tried this year to grow luffa sponges again.  I tried them two years in a row in northern Indiana and all they did was vine all over the place.  This year, in the hot south, I decided to try them again.  And they have been vining all over the place AND blooming.  Today I discovered that it has actually set a large luffa sponge gourd!  I am so thankful because now I know that I will be able to have soft and smooth skin all winter long. 

I have attached a few pictures for your viewing pleasure.

Sunflower (over 10 feet tall!)

Watermelon (just under twenty pounds at the moment!)

Luffa Gourd!

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About six months ago, AVCLUB introduced me to Hulu.com.

Hulu.com is a HUGE database of movies and TV shows (past and present) that you can watch for FREE!

You will have to watch a couple of commercials during the shows, but it is FREE!

If you have a high-speed internet connection, check it out!

I am sure that The Saving Freak is proud of me for this money saving tip!

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I love my on-line savings accounts at HSBC and ING.

Why do I like my on-line savings accounts?

• Their interest rates are competitive with CDs (HSBC's 3.50% is currently better than ING's 3.00%), yet there are no liquidity or penalty issues for pulling money out early.  By the way, HSBC just raised their rate to 3.50%.  I am betting that ING is pondering a change too.
• There are no fees.
• Their web sites are very user-friendly.
• They are FDIC-insured up to $100,000.
• You can put up to $2,000,000 in an account.
• You can put as little as $1 in an account.
• I can move my money around very easily because it is on-line.
• I can access my accounts 24-7-365.

There are several other good on-line banks out there too.  What on-line banks are you using?

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I have a thirty-something year old house.  It has thirty-something year old house problems.  One of those problems is the fact that it still has its original HVAC units.

Now, the average American would go through life with $4.13 in the bank account and no margin for life to happen.  "Life Happens" events like the HVAC unit going out.  Luckily, Jenn and I stopped living with blinders on and have saved for such events.

So here is the story.

In February, I received a MONSTER electric bill.  My reaction was like, "OH MY GOODNESS!  I could color in a ton of squares on the Sangl Family Home Pay-Off Spectacular if I did not have this huge electric bill."  So I did what anyone would do, I lowered the temperature of the thermostat and said to myself that we would just be a little chilly.  Well, we FROZE for the month of March and received another MONSTER electric bill.

I said to myself, "This sucks.  I am FREEZING and paying a ton of money on this stupid electric bill."

Luckily in April it warmed up nicely here in SC, and I was able to turn off the HVAC units.  I have been able to leave them off until this week.  On Monday night, it was over eighty degrees in the house and humid.  So I cranked on the AC and went to sleep.  When I woke up in the morning, it was still smoking hot.

Uh oh.

I called my father-in-law who does HVAC for a living, but he lives far away.  He told me to do some stuff, but all of it would involve me electrocuting myself so I decided to call my local friendly repairman (who also happens to be in my home group).

A short survey of the situation revealed that the condenser fan was not spinning.  Thus the large electrical buzzing sound that has been coming out of the unit since FEBRUARY.  Did I mention that it was buzzing since FEBRUARY?  Oh, I guess that sound was important to note.

Turns out that I heated my house with the emergency strip heating for two straight months instead of the heat pump.  Turns out that consumes enormous amounts of electricity.  Turns out it consumed a lot of my budget for two months.

A few hundred dollars later, we are nice and cool again.  With thirty-something-year-old units.  It might help to know that I have money saved up to replace these units when they totally fail on me. 

Do you have margin in your life to absorb "Life Happens" events?

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You can read about how Jenn and I stopped being broke and won with our money in my new book, I Was Broke. Now I'm Not.  It is available via PAYPAL, AMAZON.COM, or BORDERS.COM.

Well, this weekend the family ventured out into the wild world of tent camping at a state park in the foothills of the mountains.

It was a very cheap weekend, AND we had a blast!

Cost Breakdown

• Camp Site (2 nights): $45.10
• Food (no extra cost - we brought our regular groceries):  $0.00
• Stupid Tax (left our pan at home): $14.95

Total Cost:  $60.05

We had an AWESOME time.  Here are the highlights.

• We put up the tent.  Our tent attracts rain.  It POURED both nights.  BUT both days were nice and sunny.
• We saw a copperhead snake up close.  That always makes me feel comfortable.
• I ate three smores in one sitting and then proceeded to cook another dozen marshmallows.  INCREDIBLE!
• We saw a pileated woodpecker up close.  Beautiful.
• I got to spend time with my wife and daughter without the computer, internet access, or my cell phone.
• We all got our first sunburns of the season.
• There is nothing like breakfast cooked over a campfire.  Bacon sizzling.  Eggs frying.  100% purple grape juice.  Yum.
• Melea started the fire herself with matches.  I taught her how to responsibly use matches.  I hope she remembers all of the rules.
• I had to make an emergency run to a Dollar General store for a frying pan, clothesline, and clothes pins.  I need to go to Dollar General more often!  They really have good prices, and the store was really neat, organized nicely, and clean.
• I caught ZERO fish.  First time I have been skunked all year.  I don't like that.

I need to put camping on the calendar more often!

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I hope that The Saving Freak is proud of me for this one.

MSN has a great feature on their website called "Local Gas Prices".

It is very simple to use.  Just click HERE and type in your zip code.  It will pull up the gas stations in your area with the cheapest gas prices.

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If you are moving or have recently moved, you can get a "10% Off" coupon for a purchase up to $5,000!  There are a few limitations on what you can include in the purchase, but this coupon can really help!

Jenn and I used this coupon when we were in heavy "update the house" mode last year.

Get your Lowe's "10% Off" coupon HERE.

NOTE:  I figured that if Lowe's had a 10% Off deal, then Home Depot would too.  A very short search showed that YES, Home Depot also has a very similar deal.  One can get a "10% Off" coupon from Home Depot for a purchase up to $2,000 by registering at the Home Depot moving site.  Get your Home Depot "10% Off" coupon HERE.

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You may have caught in yesterday's post that I absorbed a major expense like the transmission going on my GMC truck.  Well, that happened this month.

So here is the story.

I bought this truck from my brother nearly seven years ago.  He had purchased it new.  Early on, I noticed that the automatic transmission would shift hard whenever I drove the truck over long distances.  Once it had cooled, it would go back to shiftly nice and smooth.

So way back in 2002, I took it in to my trusted car repair guy, and he said that I should just drive it until it broke.

So I did.  It took nearly seven years for it to fail.  I won that gamble!

I took it in to my new trusted car repair guy, and he diagnosed it as "Dead On Arrival".  Upon opening the transmission, he could not believe that I was able to even put the car in reverse.

The cost?  $1,953.35.  That included replacing a broken door handle, an oil change, and some other small stuff.

Man, am I glad I have a savings account for just this sort of stuff!  In the old days, I would have been pulling out the credit card.

Maybe I should ask you the question.  Do you have money saved up for a car repair?

I am not a prophet, but I can guarantee you that your car WILL break down.  It may be today.  It may be ten years from now.  But something is going to break.  When it does, will it crush your finances or will it just be an annoyance that you have saved for? 

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My book, I Was Broke. Now I'm Not, is available via AMAZON.COM, BORDERS.COM, and PAYPAL.  You can read the Introduction HERE.